


there is a light that never goes out

by flwrpotts



Category: Archie Comics & Related Fandoms, Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: F/M, anguish is my personal brand, penny gets her revenge, there's blood so be forewarned
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-21
Updated: 2018-01-21
Packaged: 2019-03-07 17:43:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13439925
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flwrpotts/pseuds/flwrpotts
Summary: The picture that appears is grainy, almost indistinguishable on the tiny screen of his shitty flip phone. But he sees the glint of blonde hair, that cinematic shade of blonde that he could recognize in his sleep, and all the air leaves his body, a choking exhale. It’s like he’s been sucker punched by the entire football team, the terror that overtakes him.Jughead’s distantly aware that he is stopped in the middle of the school parking lot, that there are cars honking as he blocks traffic, but he cannot stop staring at the message thread, at the sentence that appears underneath.you really thought breaking up with her would protect her from me? and f.p calls you the smart one!





	there is a light that never goes out

**Author's Note:**

> hello! welcome to today's installment of "julia can't write happy things!" also, this was written for ephemeral-existences for the prompt 43. “I am not losing you again!”. i...took some liberties with it. I hope you enjoy!!!

_and if a double decker bus/_

_crashes into us/_

_to die by your side is such a heavenly way to die/_

\- there is a light that never goes out, the smiths

* * *

 

For as long as he can remember, Jughead has hated Wednesdays. It’s an indisputable fact, one of the only certainties in his life- grass is green, the sky is blue, bad things happen on Wednesdays. 

His mother left on a Wednesday, disappearing into the sullen, foggy morning with a kiss on his cheek and Jellybean crying in her arms. The drive-in closed on a Wednesday, too, leaving him with a backpack full of cans of discount soup and a rattling, soul-sucking panic. The day of his father’s arrest, when the Black Hood was finally unmasked- all Wednesdays. So, it should come as no surprise that the world falls apart on a Wednesday.

He’s in science lab, ostensibly helping Toni dissect a frog and in reality staring at Betty’s empty seat across the room, wondering at the empty air. Even after everything, one breakup after another and the newfound tension that thrums between them, he can feel her absence; the missing space where she should be intently focused on her lab manual, safety goggles leaving adorable red marks on her nose. He’s just starting to internally debate sending her a text when Veronica turns to him.

She’s dressed imepccably, as per usual, white lab coat juxtaposing sharply against her dark lipstick and pearls. _Do you know where Betty is?_ she mouths, eyes narrowed and untrusting. He shakes his head no, and her mouth twists, displeased. He can’t help but notice the faint shadow of worry in her eyes, and he feels his pulse jump up into his throat.

Veronica taps the sharp point of her heel against the old wood of the desk for a few beats, looking like she’s about to say more, but decides against it, turning back to where Archie is currently butchering their final grade. Jughead would laugh, if not for the shiver of worry that crawls its way up his spine.

It’s sixth period already, which means that Betty should have texted Veronica with an explanation by now. He has a vivid memory of her _terrible cold- get the science homework for me?_ texts, punctuated with an emoji or smiley face. Jughead’s heart begins to race, mind conjuring up a hundred ways she could be injured or in trouble. _You’re being paranoid_ he thinks to himself, _Betty can take of herself._

 _Betty was also sent a severed finger in the mail less than two weeks ago_ says the snide voice in his brain, the one that can’t help but play devil’s advocate.

“What’s your damage, Tim Burton?” Toni asks, levelling him with an unimpressed look as she neatly severs an eyeball. He starts, pulled out of his internal debate.

“Betty isn’t in school,” he says, terse, “And she hasn’t texted Veronica where she is.”

“And?”

“She always texts when she misses school,” he replies shortly, suddenly frustrated with having to explain himself. For once, he doesn’t want to feel like the only one worrying, the only one with the sense that something terrible is about to happen. He moves to run an agitated hand through his hair, only to stop short when he remembers his formaldehyde soaked latex gloves.

“Calm down, Loverboy,” Toni says, not unkindly, “She probably forgot. Betty’s a big girl- she can take care of herself.”

He nods once, trying to dissolve the faint sense of panic pressing down on his chest. Toni’s surety eases some of his anxiety, and he throws himself back into the instructions, staunchly suppressing memories of the last time he had wielded a blade against flesh.

The rest of the period passes by too slowly, full of dissection induced nausea and shooting long glances at the empty seat, but the bell signaling the end of the day still startles Jughead. He nods at Toni in an informal goodbye, slinging his backpack over one shoulder.

“See you later?”

“Yeah, Wyrm at eight.”

The hall is packed when he wades out, the pulsing ebb and flow of a high school ecosystem. Three months ago, he would have found himself pressed into the lockers by the whooping crowds of jocks and clusters of cheerleaders, all trying to leave as quickly as possible. Now, though, it’s as if there’s some sort of forcefield around him, making nervous freshmen and band kids swerve out of his path. The change is as quietly thrilling as it is disconcerting.

He’s hardly out the door before his jacket is back on, removed from where it’s been stashed in his backpack all day. The sense of security is immediate, like a rush of blood to the head. He heads over to the motorbike, absentmindedly pulling his phone out of his pocket as he goes.

Jughead sees the blinking sign showing an unread text message and clicks on it absently, more focused on trying to work out whether or not he can afford Pop’s for dinner than whatever obscure historical fact Toni’s doubtlessly sent him. But then the photo loads, sent by an unknown number, and every thought disappears from his head, displaced by the sudden, all-consuming panic.

The picture that appears is grainy, almost indistinguishable on the tiny screen of his shitty flip phone. But he sees the glint of blonde hair, that cinematic shade of blonde that he could recognize in his sleep, and all the air leaves his body, a choking exhale. It’s like he’s been sucker punched by the entire football team, the terror that overtakes him.

As if in a daze, he absorbs all the details: Betty, in some indistinguishable warehouse, pink sweater bloodied. Blood across her temple, like she had been struck by something hard. _This cannot be happening._ He takes in the way she’s sitting up straight, even with her hands bound, the way her chin is up even as he reads the plain, naked fear in her eyes.

Jughead’s distantly aware that he is stopped in the middle of the school parking lot, that there are cars honking as he blocks traffic, but he cannot stop staring at the message thread, at the sentence that appears underneath. y _ou really thought breaking up with her would protect her from me? and f.p calls you the smart one_

His mind goes blank, white-hot with panic. _What do I do?_ Like some sort of fucked-up modern Oracle, another message appears underneath the first. _1313 ware street greendale. call the police or one of your friends and she loses an eye. better get there quick- wouldn’t want her to bleed out before u arrived ! ;)_ Jughead’s stomach twists, all terror and nausea and so much fear he can taste it in the back of his throat, like blood. _Eye for an eye he thinks to himself_ , almost nonsensically, _life for a life._ He can’t quite remember how the saying goes. But the intent is clear: Jughead got his pound of flesh. And now Penny is getting hers. 

The urgency keeps stunning him over and over, like hysterical defibrillators, and he finds himself on the bike without remembering the walk over to it, the engine already roaring to life under his shaking hands. He knows the address; he’d know it anywhere- it’s the same one she had sent him to on the drug run that terrible night, when all his fear and paranoia had been thrown into sharp relief by that apocalyptic voice on the radio.

It’s January, and the air is bitter, rushing through his jacket and whipping at his face as he rides the motorcycle far above the speed limit. He’s shivering, but it’s unclear whether it’s from the cold or the fear. _Please let her be okay_ he thinks, _I will do anything, just let her be okay._

Jughead thinks about calling Sweet Pea or Archie or _anyone_ , but he remembers Penny’s threat, and his throat closes. He has to do this on his own. It seems so obvious in retrospect- of course she was going to get her retribution, of _course_ it would be Betty, the one she had used against him before. And yet, somehow, he didn’t expect Penny to understand that it always came back to Betty, that she’s the one thing he can’t stand to lose entirely. He didn’t expect her to know that the queen was the most important piece on the board. 

He strides into the warehouse, heart beating in double time, and it’s nearly comical, how easy it is to find them. Penny’s never been one for subtlety, and she grins broadly, all teeth, when Jughead rounds the corner, twirling a knife absently between her fingers. Jughead feels the air leave his body when he sees the gun stuck in her back pocket. It’s every horror movie he’s ever scene all at once, every cliche film he’s binged with an XL bucket of popcorn at the Twilight. 

But he’s never been a knight in shining armor, the hero of the story, and Betty sure as hell isn’t a damsel in distress. His head spins, trying to wrap his brain around the tableau in front of him. 

Betty’s tied to a chair, wrists zip-tied behind her, but her shoulders are back and her spine is straight, despite the fear that shines in her eyes. He feels a brief, stinging pride in her, the sort that always just hurts.  

“ _Jug,”_ she says, relief palpable, and Penny laughs like a hyena. She paces the floor, full of that unsettling, reckless energy, tinged with mania. 

“Yes, _Jug,”_ she echoes. “We’ve been waiting on you.” Jughead notices the lack of her Serpents jacket first and the thick shroud of bandages on her forearm second. He stifles a flinch, repulsed by the physical reminder of his own capacity for violence. 

“Let her go, Penny,” he says, injecting his voice with a confidence that rings hollow, even to him. “This is between you and me. She has nothing to do with it.”

Penny laughs- full-bodied, head tipped back and molars sharp. Jughead fantasizes for a singular moment about snapping her neck. The burn self-loathing that follows is sharp and immediate. 

“You poor sucker,” she replies, smug. “She has _everything_ to do with it. You took away what was most important to me, so now I’m going to take away what’s most important to you. It’s simple, really. Practically biblical in nature.”

She turns back to Betty. “Or did Jughead not tell you about what him and his little friends did?”

And this is part of the game, too, Jughead knows. But Betty’s never been one to play by the rules. 

“Of course he did,” she says, bluffing. “And I don’t care.” She says it with such confidence that even Jughead is tempted to believe it; tossing her hair over one shoulder- impressive, considering that her hands are zip-tied behind her back. Penny looks unsettled for only a half a second before she’s again grinning, shark-like. 

“Really? You don’t care that your little boyfriend- oh, right _ex-_ boyfriend decided to slice my tattoo off my harm? The golden girl of Riverdale is really alright with an innocent woman being held down and mutilated?”

Betty blinks at her, seemingly unperturbed, but her eyes shine bright with realization, and Jughead feels his heart plummet. It shouldn’t matter, when they’re in a literal life or death situation, and yet, he’s always cared a little too much about what Betty thinks of him. 

Penny continues, undaunted by Betty’s lack of response. “But _how_ could you have known, when he dumped you a week before it happened? What was it, again? For your _protection._ Doesn’t matter that you stripped like a common Serpent slut, you’re still the precious Northsider, too fragile to know about his _real_ life.”

Anger rises through his body, curdling the fear, but Betty only tilts her head with that challenging, confident smirk, the one that means she holds all the cards.

“If your whole goal here is to get revenge on Jughead, I don’t really see why you’re wasting time psychoanalyzing high school relationships.”

Penny sneers. “I’m just taking my time. Nobody’s going to know Riverdale’s princess is missing for _hours._ And he’s a nothing, just like his father. He could be missing for weeks and no one would know. We have plenty of time to sit him down and make him watch as I do to you exactly what he did to me.”

Jughead notices with a start that Betty is fumbling with the zip ties binding her hands behind her back, lip bitten with her focus, and a bolt of hope strikes him. He can hear her, like she’s spoken aloud to him: _stall for time._

 _“_ I’d hardly call you an innocent, Penny” he protests, voice a little too loud, a little too showy. “I mean, you blackmailed me for _weeks._ Forced Archie and I into a drug run. Threatened _Betty_. What, did you think I was just going to let that happen? That the rest of the Serpents were?”

Penny moves to face him, and Betty fumbles with the zip-ties, brow furrowed in a focused concentration. It’s an unbelievable effort not to look at her, at the blood that drips from her lip where she’s bitten down too hard, but Jughead focuses his attention on Penny. 

“Is that what you think happened?” she says, but it doesn’t matter, because Betty’s freed her hands with a half of that triumphant, incandescent smile. 

Penny starts to turn, doubtlessly about to launch into another self-righteous, terrifying monologue, but Betty is ready for her, slamming the rusty metal chair into her stomach with her full strength, making the older woman fall. Jughead feels relief for the split second it takes before Penny, dazed but still-lethal, pulls the gun from her back pocket and shoots. It all happens so fast Jughead can’t process it, a slurry of violence spilling out in front of him. 

Betty crumples to the floor, blood already blooming from the front of her sweater, and Jughead moves before he can can quite process what he’s doing. Penny whips around from where she’s on her knees, turning the gun on him, but Jughead is too close. He grabs the gun from her hands, and cracks it against her head, rendering her unconscious. 

Jughead swallows bile, sickened once again by his own capacity for inflicting pain, and the gun shakes in his hands, but then Betty makes a tiny, terrible sound, and he is instantly at her side, panicking as he takes in all the _blood._ It should be impossible, for so much blood to come out of a person, and Jughead panics, scrabbling to find the exit wound. 

“Hey, hey- you’re okay, alright, Betts? You’re going to be just fine,” he murmurs, desperate, as he presses his fingers to the bullet hole in her stomach, fingers slippery with blood as he tries to apply pressure. 

He dials 911 with the other hand, not bothering to talk to the operator on the other end, asking him what the problem is. “Someone’s been shot, we need help,” he snaps, fast and impatient, hanging up the phone as soon as he’s done. Betty is terrifyingly pale, sweat a sheen on her forehead and breathing labored. There are no words to describe the torrent of fear in his chest, the terror so raw it feels like a physical blow. 

“Juggie,” she says, _smiling_ at him faintly, but whatever she’s going to say is cut off by a sharp gasp of pain.

“Hey, Betts, no, you gotta stay awake for me,” he says, pleading, and he doesn’t realize he’s crying until the salt water drips onto her face. 

“Wasn’t your fault,” she says, voice slurred by pain. “Penny. ’S okay. I forgive you. We’ve all- we’ve all done bad things.”

Jughead doesn’t know what to do with that, doesn’t even know how to _try_ to deserve forgiveness, especially not from her.

“I’m sorry,” he says instead. “I’m so fucking sorry, Betts. For everything.” He brushes away the tears from his eyes with aggravation, and then smoothes back her hair from her temple, trying to communicate everything he feels for her without having to say it. 

“I love you. I love you. Just- just stay awake, okay? An ambulance is on it’s way, and you’re gonna be fine, okay, you’re going to be _fine._ I promise.”

“I love you too,” she says faintly, and there is blood everywhere, enough to drown in, when her eyelashes flutter, sticky with mascara and tears and gore. 

“No, no, stay awake, _Betty, please,”_ he says, begging, but she’s unconscious, body going limp in his arms. Jughead presses careful fingers to her neck, and a sob escapes his chest when he feels her heartbeat, beating too faintly. 

The paramedics hammer at the door, finally, and Jughead looks up, teary-eyed from where he has his face pressed into the damp crown of Betty’s hair, fallen out of its ponytail and pale gold in the harsh, fluorescent light. His hand lingers near her face, and each too-shallow breath that brushes his palm feels like a small miracle. He keeps waiting for her to die, one minute giving way into another, keeps waiting for the end of the world.

The EMTs call out something indistinguishable through the flimsy wood, and Jughead wishes feverishly that they were already inside, that the door was nothing but splinters. Getting up feels impossible, as herculean an effort as Betty springing up and answering herself, but he does it, gritting his teeth all the while. He eases her off of his lap and onto the floor- freezing, dusty concrete- and brushes her hair back from her face, one hand still pressed to the gunshot wound steadily pumping blood in time to her heartbeat. 

He stands too quick and stumbles, feeling drunk, feeling like his head is a helium balloon and his body concrete, listing as he makes his way to the bolted door. He throws it open with a quick, sloppy movement, sagging against the wall when the when the paramedics begin to stream in, so clean and white it hurts to look at. The adrenaline runs neck and neck with the exhaustion, and he blinks slowly, dizzily. 

The next time his eyes open, there’s a paramedic in front of him, eyes creased with concern.

“Sir, are you alright? Are you hurt?”

“She’s over there,” he says, lips numb, forgetting about Penny’s unconscious body, only a handful of feet away. “She’s bleeding out.”

He slides out of the man’s grip easily, backing away from the door. It’s a kind of horror, seeing Betty pale as a corpse and still bleeding, the chain of her gold cross necklace pooling on the floor. He sinks to his knees beside her and presses an ear to her chest, tears sliding hotly over the bridge of his nose when he hears the faint pound of her heartbeat. Still alive. 

Paramedics swarm around them, trying to maneuver him away so they can treat her. He feels a hand at his shoulder, pulling him back, and he sits up agitatedly. Their calmness feels unspeakably wrong when his life is an exposed neck and Betty’s death the dropping of a guillotine. 

“Please,” he says. “Please help her.” They’re surrounded by equipment, gurneys and med kits and IVs, but they’re moving too slowly; time is feeding directly into a wide open drain. He wants to shake them, wants to punch someone, wants to stitch Betty up himself. Anything but this- watching helplessly, as one says to the other _she’s lost a lot of blood, sats are below fifty._ His voice is quiet, pitched low in a way Jughead knows he wasn’t supposed to hear, and his heart pounds too loud in his ears, like sex, or a gunshot. 

The first man presses a hand to the wound, staunching the pulse of blood, and Jughead flinches, like it’s him being prodded.

“You can’t-” he starts, knee-jerk. The paramedics turn to look at him expectantly, and he stops, floundering for a way to finish the sentence. For the first time in his life, words fail, prove themselves entirely inadequate. “Don’t hurt her,” he says instead, pleading, voice run ragged. “She’s- everything I have.” 

    There’s a round of nodding and then the quick _one-two-three_ of lifting her onto the gurney, her skin the same ashy white of the sterile material. Jughead wobbles to his feet, unsteady, and watches as one arm dangles off the side of the cot, the same elegant, fine-boned wrist that he’s seen a thousand times- twisting her hair into its signature ponytail or taking meticulous notes or carding through his hair, so fond it almost hurt. 

His vision goes fuzzy around the edges, short circuiting, and the third EMT, a woman with soft eyes and neatly tied-back hair, steadies him with a hand to his bicep. 

“Are we gonna need a second gurney she asks?” voice sympathetic, and he shakes his head roughly. 

“I’m fine,” he says tersely. “Just worry about her.”

She nods once, turning back to Betty, and he follows, desperate not to fall out of step. He can’t decide whether it’s selfish or not, how desperately he wishes he was the one shot instead, to grapple with a bullet instead of this panic. They make their way outside, clunky like a funeral procession, and the January wind is harsher than ever, unrelenting. He feels himself shiver, mechanical, but can’t quite feel the cold that seeps into his bones. 

The ambulance is parked outside the warehouse, screaming neon, and they load Betty into it, Jughead with his hand laced firmly through hers. He stares down at her face, the curve of her jaw and arch of her eyebrow, and then the ghostly pallor of her face and her blue-tinged lips. The difference between her usual expression and the lax one before him is horrifying, and the thought of her eyes going dull forever is enough to ratchet up his breathing again. 

He cannot imagine a world without Betty Cooper in it. It’s unfathomable- a universe where she is not there to bake chocolate chip cookies or complete punnett squares or kiss him with her lips coated in vanilla-scented lip gloss. _Until it sticks_ he had said, and it isn’t until now that the hollowness of the statement rings true. Some small, reckless part of him had always believed in them, had always believed that somehow, they would always find their way back to one another. It was the same tiny crawlspace in his mind that still believed his mother would come home one day, the place where he kept his most sacred, frantic hopes. 

He presses her palm to his mouth and whispers _please do not die, I will do anything, just do not die._ The third paramedic sends him a long, sympathetic glance. 

The rest of the ride is chaos, a checklist of anxious questions and requests for Jughead to explain _exactly_ what happened, all punctuated by the ceaseless ringing of his cellphone and the skittering, frantic beat of his heart, fast enough to make him taste acid in the back of his throat.

He wonders, distantly, what happened to Penny whether anybody removed her from the crime scene, or if she would just be left to rot, _ashes to ashes, dust to dust._

They round the corner to the hospital and Jughead throws himself out the back of the ambulance before it comes to a complete stop, ready for the nightmare to be over, ready for a doctor to tell him that Betty would make a full recovery. 

“Ready a trauma room,” the paramedic calls, followed by a series of abbreviations he doesn’t have time to puzzle out, and then they are wheeling Betty in, everything happening so fast that he doesn’t realize he’s lost sight of her until she’s already gone. 

He whips his head around, disoriented, and then there’s an orderly, trying to shepherd him to the waiting room. He throws a punch, panicked, and then it’s a crush of security and orderlies, trying to wrangle him. Jughead starts kicking, and it’s almost a relief, having some way to channel out the reckless, terror-struck energy that’s been thrumming through him in a constant positive feedback loop. He feels his fist break a nose with a satisfying crunch, and then he is being overwhelmed, surrounded by too many bodies. 

“ _Wait_ \- Wait, what the fuck, stop-” he exclaims, his arms getting manhandled behind his back. The fight goes out of him all at once, limbs relaxing from where they’re being held, and he lets himself be dragged into the waiting room. The security guard deposits him into a chair, clapping a hand on his back in a gesture that’s meant to be reassuring, but makes Jughead jump. 

“They’ll notify you when we have some more information,” he says, and Jughead nods, 

defeated, hunching over the shitty plastic chair to press his face into his hands. He digs the palms of his hands into his eyes until he sees stars, and then exhales, hard. 

He feels worn thin by the hours of ceaseless panic, the exhaustion grinding down on his bones. Distantly, he realizes his cellphone is still ringing, has been the entire time. He digs it out of his pocket, flipping it open without checking to see who’s calling. 

“What?” he says flatly, body still folded in on itself, breathing through his mouth to avoid the sterile, dead smell of the waiting room. 

“Jughead!” exclaims Veronica, voice strung high and thin the way it does when she’s 

stressed. “Have you heard from Betty? She hasn’t texted me back, and then I dropped by her house, and Alice said she hasn’t seen her all day, and there are police sirens everywhere, and-”

“Veronica,” he says, cutting her off. “I’m, um-I’m at Riverdale General Hospital.”

  “Ohmygod,” she exhales in a single breath. Veronica’s always been smarter than she looks, and Jughead is unduly grateful for her ability to put the pieces together. “Is Betty alright? Are _you?_ What happened?”

“It’s a long story,” he replies, weary. “But- you should get here quick. Bring Archie”

“We’re in the car right now. We’ll be there in fifteen.”

She hangs up without waiting for a reply, and Jughead listens to the dial tone a second too long before he snaps the phone shut. 

The minutes seem to drag on, and he watches the news absently, mind still racing, barely able to comprehend the endless shitshow of car crashes and wildfires and nuclear warfare. 

He wants to search through every room in the goddamned hospital until he finds her, until he can feel the pulse in her wrist for himself. He wants for this day to never have happened, for him to have never made a deal with Penny, to take back the first time he ever put on that fucking jacket and called it safety. He _wants_ , so ardently that it feels something like a prayer, even though he’s never been a believer. 

He leaps out of his seat when he hears the door open, expecting to see the doctor, but instead it’s just Veronica and Archie, sprinting over to him. 

Veronica strides in with her signature cinematic flair, looking a movie star washed ashore in Riverdale. But then she gets closer, and he sees the faint signs of distress- the mascara smudged across her eyelid and tiny run up the back of her tights. Archie, for his part, has his face twisted in that mask of completely honest concern, scanning Jughead up and down as he takes in all the blood. 

Jughead is struck suddenly by deja vu, of the last time he was here, waiting to hear news about Fred. Only this time the blood is on his hands, and Archie is the one left with no information, with a gaping lack of knowledge like a bullet hole. 

“It was Penny,” he says to Archie, because he can’t bear to explain the twisted, gut-wrenching story in its entirety. “We- the Serpents, we, um- drove her out. She knew hurting Betty was a good way to hurt me back.”

Archie nods, understanding dawning on his face, but Veronica looks even more pissed than before. 

“Who is _Penny?_ And what do you mean _by hurting Betty?_ Is she okay? Where is all of the blood from?”

“Betty managed to break out of her bindings, attack Penny, but she had a gun. Betty took a hit in the stomach. I’m- I don’t know how bad it is, but there was so much blood. I don’t know what to do.”

Veronica’s face crumples, tears filling in her eyes, and it’s the first time he’s ever seen her not perfectly composed, not entirely in control of the situation. Before he quite knows what he’s doing, he hugs her, so fucking _relieved_ that he’s not the only one choking on his own fear. Archie throws his arms around them both, and they stand like that, in the strange, liminal space of the Riverdale General Hospital waiting room. 

After a minute, Veronica pulls back, procuring a Kleenex from her purse to dab away the tear tracks. 

“I’m going to call Betty’s parents,” she announces. “I don’t think the hospital’s called them yet.”

Both boys nods, and she walks out into the hallways, a little unsteady on her feet. Jughead sinks back down into the incredibly uncomfortable plastic chair, Archie following suit. 

“Seriously, man, she’s gonna be okay,” Archie says, earnest, and the sob that’s been building in Jughead’s chest finally erupts, much to his acute disbelief. 

He heaves a ragged, shuddering breath and puts his face in his hands, entirely undone. He tries to put words to the landslide of feeling in his chest. 

“This is all my fault,” he says, voice filled with enough misery to drown in. “She never would have gotten hurt if it wasn’t for me.”

“Jug, no,” Archie begins to protest, but he cuts him off.

“No matter what I do, someone gets hurt,” he says, unrelenting. “My dad, Betty, you. It’s just- collateral damage. I made the deal with Penny, I made Betty a target. It’s all my _fault._ ”

“Jug, I love you like you’re my brother,” Archie says, voice serious in a way it rarely is, “but you’re being a fucking idiot.”

It’s such an unexpected sentence that Jughead starts, sitting up from his keeled-over position. 

“What?”

“When you first made the deal with Penny, you were trying to help your Dad. You had no way of knowing that she was going to blackmail you. And I don’t know how you ‘drove Penny out’ or whatever, but I know you wouldn’t have done it if you thought you had any other choice. You’re always trying to protect the people around you, Jug, not hurt them.”

Jughead shakes his head, and moves to speak, but Archie still isn’t finished. 

“I know Betty got hurt tonight, but you have to stop this ‘protecting’ thing you’re doing. Breaking up with her is making you both miserable when you don’t have to be. Betty can make her own decisions, and you gotta trust her to decide which risks she’s willing to take. It’s not your choice, anymore. You both deserve to be happy.”

It’s a side of Archie Jughead rarely sees, the surprisingly intelligent one that people tend to overlook. Jughead knows, logically, that he can’t let go of the guilt, not yet, but the knot in his chest becomes a little less tight. He nods once, and Archie throws an arm around his shoulder, the familiar weight of his Letterman jacket. 

Veronica, always a master of timing, re-enters then, eyes slightly reddened. She sits down on Archie’s lap, and his arms come up around her, rubbing soothing circles into her back. She sniffles once before speaking. 

“Alice and Hal are on their way,” she says, and lets the silence fall like a curtain. 

Jughead gets called in to give a statement to the police soon after, and the next several hours see the waiting room filling up with people- Betty’s parents, Kevin and Ethel, and even Cheryl Blossom. 

But Jughead hardly believes his eyes when he sees the Serpents walk through the door at two in the morning- Toni, Sweet Pea, Fangs, and the rest of the crew, looking somber in their leather jackets. 

“We heard the news,” Toni says, plopping into the seat beside Jughead and handing him a grease-stained bag from Pop’s. “She gonna pull through?”

Jughead lifts a shoulder in a miserable shrug, and Sweet Pea lets out a long breath, clapping him on the back sympathetically. 

“It was Penny?” Toni asks, and he nods. 

“That bitch,” curses Sweet Pea, looking ready to throw a punch. “I swear to God, we’ll make her pay for it.”  
“This,” Jughead says, gesturing around the room with his hand, “Is punishment for the first time we made her pay for something.”

“Fuck that,” says Toni. “This won’t go unanswered. Serpents take care of their own, and like it or not, Betty did the dance. Justice is gonna be served.”

 _And that’s the problem with Riverdale,_ Jughead thinks to himself, picking at an order of fries, _we’re all so obsessed with justice, with goodness. The cycle is never going to end._ The thought is a sobering one, but it’s lost in the waves of fear and pre-emptive mourning coursing through him. 

It’s half past three in the morning when the doctor walks out, and a crowd quickly forms around him, full of people waiting to hear news. Alice Cooper- teary eyed and disheveled- makes her way to the front of the crowd. 

“Well?” she asks, voice frantic, and the doctor moves the Cooper family over to the other corner, out of earshot. Jughead watches desperately, trying to interpret their facial expressions, searching for some sign, _any_ sign, that Betty is alive, that she’s going to survive. 

He watches as Alice turns away from the doctor, and he’s shocked when she approaches him before anyone else. 

“Betty is going to be alright,” she says, voice loud enough to be overheard, and Jughead’s knees buckle underneath him, a relief so sharp that he doesn’t know how to bear it. Sweet Pea and Archie haul him back up, their mutual resentment momentarily forgotten, but Jughead can’t hear anything else as Alice explains in exacting detail the prognosis. 

Veronica cries, Cheryl’s eyes soften, and even Toni smiles when the news travels around the room. The Cooper family disappears, presumably to see Betty, and Jughead folds himself back into the seat, drinking the black coffee Fangs had pressed into his hands. The relief hits him over and over again, his brain looping the sentence _Betty is going to be alright._

It’s an hour later when Hal comes over to where the Serpents are clustered. “Betty just woke up,” he says, smiling a little sadly. “She’s been asking for you.”

Jughead freezes, not moving until Toni gives him a playful shrug. “Go!” she says, “Go see your girl.”

Jughead nods, following Hal down into the fluorescent bleached hallway, still a little creeped out by the overly retro nurses uniforms. But all of those thoughts disappear from his brain when he enters the hospital room to see Betty Cooper, pale and hooked up to fifteen different monitors, but _alive,_ and awake. 

 _“_ We’ll give you two some privacy,” Hal says, shepherding Alice out and closing the door behind him. Jughead swallows the lump in his throat, suddenly at a loss for what to say. Someone’s washed the blood out of her hair, and he would be tempted to describe her as _angelic,_ if he didn’t know that she would loathe the descriptor. 

“Juggie,” Betty says, smiling softly, and he sinks down into the seat beside her, taking one scarred, freezing hand in his own. 

“Betts,” he replies. “How- how are you feeling?”

“Like I was shot by a blond psychopath,” she says, grinning wryly, and Jughead flinches. “Too soon?”

 

“And I always thought sardonic humor was my thing.” 

They both smile, but the mood darkens when Jughead sobers and says “Betty, I am so, so sorry. About Penny and about not telling you the truth and just- for everything. I am so fucking sorry. I would do everything differently, if I could.”

“I’m still angry at you, Jug,” she replies, looking down at their linked hands. “I can protect myself, and what risks I take are not yours to decide.”

Jughead nods, another apology building, but she isn’t finished. Betty presses her other hand over his and says “I’ve spent all of these weeks just- missing you. And I’m so tired of it. I’m angry, but I still love you. I meant it when I said I didn’t know how to stop. If there’s anything I’ve learned, it’s that as long as we’re in Riverdale, we’re not really safe. No one is.” She takes a deep breath, steeling herself up. “I don’t want to lose you again. So can we just- try again? Forget about the gangs and the serial killers and the crazy mothers, and just be Betty and Jughead?” Betty closes her eyes, allowing two shiny tears to spill over. 

Jughead takes their interwoven hands and presses them to his mouth, the gesture a ghost of all those months ago, of the first time she had ever shown him the darkest parts of herself. 

“That’s all I’ve ever wanted,” he says, voice cracking with honesty, leaving over to press a soft chaste, kiss to her mouth. She smiles, still bright amongst all the darkness, and he does too, kissing her with all the tenderness he can muster. 

Veronica visits not long after, hugging her carefully and scanning for damage, frowning when she takes in the thick bandaging over Betty’s abdomen. People file in, one by one, and Jughead watches as Cheryl walks into the room, nods once, and leaves again, seemingly satisfied to see for herself that Betty is breathing. Even the Serpents make an appearance, filing in around her bed. 

“Hey, we match,” Sweet Pea says, lifting the hem of his shirt to reveal a matching gunshot scar. Betty laughs, and Jughead feels the residual terror humming through him start to receded, dissolving into the night air. 

They leave soon after, but Jughead stays, after receiving guarded approval from Alice. He ends up sleeping on the other side of the hospital bed, her hair in his mouth and his converse dangling over the side of the bed, and things aren’t perfect, but for the first time in a very, very long time, Jughead thinks they might be okay. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> thank you so much for reading!!! comments & kudos are my lifeblood, and you can find me on tumblr @flwrpotts !


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